Chapter 32: The Song Went Viral
Sophie Wexler was completely unaware of this, only returning home after a shopping spree.
On her way, she overheard people talking: "Have you heard this song? It’s super popular!"
"Of course, how could I not? The video blew up last night. I’ve had it on repeat all day, it’s so good."
"Me too!" the person said excitedly. "I heard that in just one day, the song has already taken over the number one spot on all the music charts!"
Sophie Wexler listened for a moment before muttering to herself, "Has some new artist released a new song recently?"
’How come I don’t know about it?’
’I’ve only been off StarNet for a few days, how am I so out of the loop?’
’Wasn’t the music scene in the Entertainment District pretty dead? Did it suddenly get popular?’
After getting home, she handed her things to Tammy and had it put them away.
Then, she opened StarNet to see what was going on with the Entertainment District’s music charts.
But just trying to log into her account took forever, and it wouldn’t go through. Sophie Wexler: "?"
’What’s going on? Is the StarNet connection bad today? Why can’t I even log in?’
The next second, she realized it wasn’t a network problem. Her login page had crashed from being overloaded!
The moment she got on, countless notification chimes sounded one after another without a single pause, making her ears ring.
Not to mention the endless stream of messages flashing by, so fast that it was impossible to read any of them.
Sophie Wexler: "?!?!"
Sophie Wexler slowly blinked twice. "Did I log into the wrong account?"
’This bombardment of messages... is this really my account?’
Sophie Wexler even glanced up to double-check. Yes, it was definitely hers.
The new follower count read 99999+, comments 99999+, and private messages 99999+.
Staring at those numbers, Sophie Wexler’s brain completely short-circuited for a few seconds.
’So, that hit song I heard about on the street... was mine!’
While Sophie Wexler was still in a daze, a message window lit up, followed by a barrage of new messages.
It was the account of a platform staff member. The only reason Sophie Wexler could spot it amidst the flood of messages was that she had pinned the conversation for easier communication last time.
The little red dot indicated just how many messages he had sent her. Sophie Wexler clicked on it.
[Entertainment District Admin: Miss Wexler, are you online?]
[Entertainment District Admin: Miss Wexler, your song is a hit.]
[Entertainment District Admin: Miss Wexler, your song blew up! You need to start a live stream, now!!!]
[Entertainment District Admin: Miss Wexler, where are you?!! Where are you?!! Please show up, ahhhhhhh!]
Seeing the long string of "ah’s" after that message, she could perfectly imagine how frantic the staff member behind the account was.
At first, it was a constant bombardment of messages. Then, he must have realized Sophie Wexler wasn’t online, so the frequency slowed down, but he still kept checking in every hour.
The last message was [Entertainment District Admin: Miss Wexler, you have to reply to me when you get online and see my message.]
[Entertainment District Admin: Miss Wexler, please get online soonnnnnn——]
You could tell he had gone from being incredibly anxious at the beginning to somewhat dejected by the end.
Sophie Wexler quickly replied: [Sorry, I just got online and saw your messages.]
On the other end of the platform, a staff member was slumped over his desk, staring at his Light Brain screen. His eyes were nearly lifeless. "When on earth is Miss Wexler going to get on—" he whined, dragging out the last word.
Just after he said that, a notification chime sounded. The admin figured it was just another useless spam message, sighed, and slowly lifted his eyelids.
The next second, his listless eyes shot wide open! The light in his pupils practically burst out!
He leaped up from his chair in excitement!
"Miss Wexler replied!!!"
Hearing the shout, the supervisor immediately came over and told him to message Sophie Wexler right away.
The page was frozen for a long time before it finally recovered. After replying, Sophie Wexler clicked on her own profile to take a look.
The number of likes on her song "Recovery" had reached a staggering eighty million plus!
Sophie Wexler’s eyes filled with astonishment. It had been less than five days since she uploaded the video for this song, and the likes had already hit eighty million.
To put that in perspective, even the most popular mecha combat videos on StarNet only got around ten million likes. As for the entertainment category, very few videos ever surpassed a million likes.
Her one music video had directly surpassed over eighty percent of all content on StarNet!
She opened the charts. Her song "Recovery" was sitting high in the number one spot, its popularity tens of millions of points ahead of second place—a completely crushing, landslide victory!
And her other songs were basically all on the charts too. Although not as explosive as "Recovery," their rankings were all high.
Sophie Wexler slowly blinked twice, her expression filled with utter disbelief.
Just then, a message arrived from the platform: [Entertainment District Admin: Miss Wexler, you’re finally online! I have some good news for you. Your song is a hit! A massive hit!!]
Sophie Wexler replied: [I see that.]
With a reception like this, it would be hard not to. The entire page was filled with her songs.
[Entertainment District Admin: Here’s the situation, Miss Wexler. The platform’s thinking is that you should take advantage of this popularity and start a stream right away. It would be best if you could stream for longer than usual.]
Sophie Wexler paused as she read the message.
[Entertainment District Admin: Of course, we know you previously had a set duration. Don’t worry, this is just for the time being. We will also provide you with corresponding compensation for the extra time.]
Since its creation, their Entertainment District had always been in a lukewarm state. It had even declined to the point where upper management was considering shutting down the channel entirely.
It was only saved because the supervisor argued vehemently for it. The supervisor had said: No matter what, we can’t lose entertainment. To a certain extent, it’s a vessel for culture, a way to spread cultural ideas. So even if this section’s popularity is low, we can’t get rid of it. One day, when The Galaxy is stable, entertainment will surely be revitalized.
But they waited and waited. They made countless attempts, signing all sorts of artists and streamers, but the response was always mediocre. Just when they were about to resign themselves to the entertainment section’s fate, it had unexpectedly taken off!
They had been hesitant when they signed Sophie Wexler. Now, it was clear just how right their decision to sign her had been!
[Entertainment District Supervisor: Miss Wexler, the popularity of our Entertainment District has never been this high. This will be a win-win for both of us!]
As if afraid she would refuse, he immediately followed up: [To show our sincerity, how about this: from now on, we can split the revenue from your streams 60-40. You get sixty, we get forty.]
Sophie Wexler had already been planning to agree after some consideration. But upon seeing that last message, she immediately replied: [Deal!]